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Tuesday, August 26, 2014

Abortion prevention: don't forget about the men

Consider this situation: A man chooses to have sex with a woman who he
knows will go for an abortion if she gets pregnant. She does get
pregnant. She goes to an abortionist, who performs the abortion. Which of
the three people killed the baby? The father, mother, or abortionist?

It should be obvious that all three people played a part in the
abortion. So no matter what your answer, you are partially correct.
The father chose to do the one thing that could result in a pregnancy
the mother did not want. The mother chose to abort rather than seeking out alternatives. The abortionist was the final step
in causing the death of the baby.

Keeping all of that in mind, if you could go back and talk
to one of the people—the father, mother, or abortionist—and convince them to become pro-life, which one would you choose?

Again, there's no one right answer, but I would pick the father. Talking to the abortionist could have a major impact if he's the only abortionist in town and has no one to replace him, but otherwise, the mother will just go elsewhere for the abortion. Of course talking to the mother is good because if her mind changes, the child
will live. But will she have the support of the father? He had expected the mother to have an abortion even before they had sex, which implies
that he has no interest in taking care of the child.

Talking to the father makes sense because he has the power to change
his ways and stop creating children who will be killed. He also has
the ability to support the mother in taking care of the children he is
responsible for, making the mother less likely
to want to abort. Many women abort due to fear of being a single
mother.

Outreach to women in crisis pregnancy situations is great, but we need to make sure we're reaching the men too, rather than placing all of the weight on the women. The idea that men are irrelevant to the
abortion debate is incredibly misguided.

281 comments:

I think this has a big intersection with rape culture, and more broadly, the stigma around people who prepare to make sexual decisions. I really hope it becomes the norm that "What chance of pregnancy are we running and how would we handle that?" is a conversation that happens before sex.

The more we start seeing people of all developmental stages as people, as real human lives, the more it is that people having potentially-reproductive sex need to consider that yes, they are running a chance of creating an entirely new person, which is a real paradigm shift for many people. It needs to be as much of a paradigm shift for men as for women.

I think you misunderstood the article. The point is that a man should refrain from having sex with a pro-choice woman. No sex = no unplanned pregnancy = no abortion. This is the very OPPOSITE of a man using her body. He should stay away from her.

I don't agree with the blanket statement of "rape culture" but there is definitely a sub section of men who take no responsibility for their actions. Ideally, women wouldn't reward and reinforce these people with sex, but we don't live in an ideal world. Abortion is more the symptom of a society that doesn't take responsibility for its actions, and its supporters seem to think that's great. So they've literally justified murder to avoid adult responsibility.

I'm actually curious if a man could remove an IUD without a woman noticing... They are not located in the cervix they are wedged into the uterus. I just had a really funny image of a guy playing Operation in his dialated partners cervix. Don't touch the edges!

What about fathers who want the baby, who would even offer to stay with or marry or help the mother and baby, or if she does'nt want it would even offer to accept custody of the kid if she does'nt want to{of course she'd have to carry it to term}. Men/fathers should have more rights and say in this. At least in cases where the pregnancy is an "accident" of both the mothers and fathers dooing. Fathers have few to no rights in abortion or otherwise really. So, this articles suggestion that all 3 people are responsible, but that the father should be talked too and corrected{implying he is MORE responsible} and only expecting men/fathers to be part of the debate and issue when and where they are not taking responsibility and need too, and not mentioning that many fathers lose their kids because the mother and doctor{the only people who REALLY have a say in the choice} choose to abort a child the father actually wants and wants to take responsibility for. Making this article subtly misandric.

Because you've chosen to ideologically denigrate them to a clump of cells. You used to be a clump of cells yourself. Surgicals are a crime against those who cannot speak for themselves. The morally repugnant allow and profit from elective dismemberment taking place. You are nothing but a shill to the abortion industry, and you are selling death. In hundreds of years people will look back and think "I can't believe people electively aborted" just like we think "I can't believe the Spartans threw babies off cliffs."

In all of human history that hasn't happened. Historically and presently, humans have struggled with unwanted reproduction. This has been done by contraception, abortion and infanticide. Where the first two are unavailable, the last option becomes inevitable.

You will find no one on this page arguing against birth control. But thanks for lumping in abortion with birth control. I thought "and ounce of prevention was worth a pound of cure." Especially when the cure is the termination of your own progeny.

Abortion is birth control, and abortion is a medical treatment. Until every pregnancy is wanted, and all pregnancies go without complication, there will always be a need for it. How about medication abortions? No "dismemberment" involved, just an induced miscarriage.

No. That's my response to a load of manure. I'm so sorry to hear your gyno doesn't operate according to accepted medical standards. Your IUD can come out with your period, and checking placement is recommended if you don't want a really big surprise, like no longer being protected from unwanted pregnancy. Also, nobody cuts their penis on an IUD string.

I think you should look that up with a simple Google search... wait I still have the email from my gyn:

Jess,

Your fiancé is feeling the strings, which can be a sharp, poking sensation depending on what position you are having sex in. This is likely what caused the small cut. But I promise you, that the poking sensation will go away once the strings soften.

Well now, I have read up on that subject and here's what I know. The Paragard IUD has a soft string. The Mirena IUD has a stronger string and the string needs to be cut long enough to curl around the cervix. One particular reference says if your partner can feel the string poking him, your gynecologist hasn't inserted many Mirena IUDs, or is an idiot. This comes from (bada-boom!) CUTTING THE STRING TOO SHORT, and is NOT normal, or correct placing of the device. My advice to you is to return to your idiot gynecologist to fix his/her mistake, or better yet.... find a competent doctor.

I can't do that because she quit the practice to teach people how to perform abortions. I'm not kidding. Her name is Kohar Der Simonian and you can look her up if you wish. Hope you like "Idiot gynecologist"s teaching tomorrow's abortionists!

Dr. Parker makes the trip to Mississippi from his home in Chicago twice a month. He’s Harvard educated and gave up a career as college professor and obstetrician to become an abortion provider. The realization that this would be his civil rights struggle is what he calls his “come to Jesus” moment, and he became an abortion provider on the day that Dr. George Tiller was murdered in his church.

Actually it's correlation. If she teaches them bad methods due to her "incompetence" which you claim, then she's somewhat responsible for her students being unprepared and the resulting deaths that follow.

Then why would you want to be taught by a respected doctor? Of course it follows that the quality of her experience and education will dictate her students level of education. She's done abortion demonstrations on pears as analogs SHOWING THEM HOW TO DO IT! Why would you think they would deviate from what they're taught?

Part of adult life is taking responsibility for one's actions. That doesn't mean giving birth. Mom always said people who don't want children ought to do the world a favor and not have them. Mom was wise. If you are unwilling or unable to raise a child, do the world a big favor and don't give birth.

I know a lady who loves being pregnant. She shat out two kids and basically abandoned them so that she could party and play on her ATV. Her parents and ex-bf are raising the children, who are having developmental delays because they never get any attention.

Selfish people shouldn't have kids, period. Giving birth is not proof of selflessness, not by any stretch.

The point is they aren't having a more competent person teaching them. You have to ignore this very salient point and include other tangential variables to even have an argument. You can't fathom that A begets B begets C. You are ignoring cause and effect of circumstances. Something you could really benefit to learn from.

What I have learned as a student myself: the instructor isn't always right. Having a bad instructor is definitely NOT ideal. However, the student isn't released from hi/r responsibility to question and get to the bottom of the issue, and research independently of the instructor. Having a bad instructor need not lead to bad doctors. YOUR doctor is the result of someone being told something and accepting it at face value, and not looking into it further. You are using this person as an appeal to authority that is a false authority. I have NEVER HEARD of a doctor who doesn't advise the patient to check IUD placement every few days the first month, and after each period monthly. Nor have I heard of any doctor purposely cutting the string too short for the patient to check and in the process, injuring the patient's partner. That "string softening up" is pure nonsense. The Mirena strings are like fishing line. They never soften up. Thus they need to be cut long enough to curl up around the cervix, out of the way. Apparently, there are some really BAD doctors out there.

I have changed the minds of men before on the issue. Usually it just takes educating them on the biology of human development in the womb, but sometimes it takes going into the philosophy of the abortion issue.

It's not, but I understand where you are coming from. My sympathies go out to the men who did all they legally could to save their child, but failed nonetheless.

However, what this article is saying is that if men know a woman to be abortion-minded, they should take it on themselves to not sleep with her, since the consequences would be to kill his child.

Realistically, I think if a man did not know that a woman would be predisposed to abort, and they conceive, and he does all in his power to protect that child, and fails, I do not think he is primarily, or even secondarily responsible for the death of that child. But that doesn't make him completely blameless. It is up to him to understand the woman he is with, and if he cannot ascertain that she would keep the pregnancy should he get her pregnant, he should either not have sex with her, or use a condom.

I doubt humanity will ever come to a consensus on when a "person" starts. To me, a fetus is like a blank MS Word document. It occupies around 21KB of space, so its something more than nothing. A second blank MS Word document will also occupy around 21KB of space, yet is not bitwise identical to the first one. I guess there is some unique metadata contained in even an empty file, so its kinda like unique DNA, and that metadata also identifies this file as an MS Word document. Yet besides that unique DNA, there is no actual content (but something more than "nothing"), and deleting that empty file to me seems fairly inconsequential. In the same way, a fetus is "human" no doubt, but it is devoid of content, but it is something more than "nothing". There is limitless potential (for good or bad) to that fetus, but if aborted, a new fetus later on has the same limitless potential. To me, a fetus is practicaly replaceable, and I can't make myself feel any other way. A caveat though, is that I also believe a late term fetus does start to gain content even in the womb, and I think a ban on late term abortions is reasonable. Where I draw the line, I don't know, but I think 15~20 weeks is realistic.

So in summary, I think a fetus is indeed more than "nothing", but in a practical sense, devoid of any real content until a certain grey time. Before this time, I think I would consider a woman's choice to be of more practical value than the fetus, and abortion should stay legal. After this time, while I would still side with choice, I think outlawing late-term abortions would be acceptable to me.

When I talk about it connecting to rape culture, I mean that it's not the norm for men to make sure that women know the chance of pregnancy they're running and are consenting to it before initiating sex with them. If you'd prefer I say "lack of consent culture" instead of "rape culture", that's fine with me.

I most certainly not anti-choice, and I firmly believe the only person qualified to make any choice here is the woman who is pregnant. That being said, I find aborting a fetus after it starts really responding to the outside world fairly troubling. I remember interacting with my own kid when he was still inside my wife at 25 weeks or so. What other people choose to do is none of my business, but I find myself somewhat sympathetic to the pro-life view for late-term abortions.

Life is indeed complicated, and I think there is no one-size-fits-all gold standard of morality.

Have you actual humans in the real world? Probably only a handful of Shakespeares out there, but mostly such sub-masterpieces as Seung-Hui's "Richard McBeef". Not all fetuses are precious little miracles, unfortunately.

And I think the empty Word document is more apt as I think nurture often times far outweighs the nature. Besides, if the exact genetic information in that fetus is so precious, how about a scenario in the not so distant future where you just clone the DNA and save it? Next time a couple is pregnant, maybe do some bioengineering and have twins, one from the aborted DNA?

Maybe you believe that because the PROBABILITY{this particular arrangement of DNA} is so vanishingly small, this fetus is infinitely precious. Me, I just think its another roll of a random number generator. Doesn't take too much effort to roll another particular arrangement of DNA where Probability{another particular arrangement of DNA} is also vanishingly small. So what?

I know you're not anti-chioce. I agree with you in spirit, for realz. In theory, I have zero problem with a restriction at 24 weeks, which is viability. The problem is, real life IS complicated, and I would rather have doctors worrying about their patients and not the law. No more Savita's!

Prior to having sex a man and a woman should be on the same page about how to deal with possible consequences of their actions. Hopefully, they are both responsible people and would agree that if an unexpected pregnancy happened they would do the right thing and CARE for their unborn child. If they are not on the same page about how to deal with an unexpected pregnancy they should not be having sex.

That is a great comparison. Just as people try to preserve their written documents by saving the files and making backups, they can apply that same logic to living things as well which are impossible to replace if they are lost.

I can partially agree with the pro-choice because I understand the need of someone to feel in control of their body. I do wish it were possible to grant humans this control by changing the laws of nature so that reproduction is either gone or similar to that of birds where someone else can sit on the egg if the mother does not want to. This I admit is wishful thinking, but it is a nice dream. Since it doesn't work that way, I think everything should be done to make sure that women aren't pregnant against their will or forced into aborting against their will. Sadly this is often the case. Men have the power to prevent many of these tragedies.

I'm glad that you feel that way about late term pregnancies, because I feel there is very little separating a late term fetus and a newborn. Gestation-ally the newborn is still considered fetal in a lot of ways. Humans are unique in that our newborns cannot walk and have to be encouraged to latch for feeding, they can't seek a nipple on their own devices. The price we pay for having larger brains is that our gestation is incomplete compared to other mammals when we are born. I have read reports that are pro-infanticide citing the similarities between infants and fetuses. People who use dependency to argue person-hood will lose their argument unless they consider infants to not be people.

Impossible to replace... um I don't really think so. A few week old embryo is easy to replace. Just have another one! It might not be EXACTLY the same embryo, but who cares? The first one is "unique" and "special" in just the way a random draw of 0.12144152308234251439301 from a random number generator is "unique" and "special". The probability of getting EXACTLY the same number from your generator is vanishingly small, but I would argue that just because the probability of something occurring is vanishingly small in no way makes it special.

Consider the following situation. A woman wants to use birth control, but the pro-lifers won't let her, because they have sad feelies about fertilized eggs. She then gets pregnant, and has an abortion. Who is responsible for the abortion?

The idea that pro-lifers are not themselves responsible for a lot of abortions is incredibly misguided.

Consider the following situation, which was actually written about in a science fiction book. A serial killer (Oliver Guest) with a Ph.D. in several sciences goes around killing 14 year old girls who live in what he considers to be 'bad circumstances', takes a tissue sample from his murder victims, then clones them, brings the fetus to term in some artificial wombs, and raises the resultant infants under what he considers to be 'proper circumstances'.

According to your pro-life philosophy, in which a 'person' is defined by nothing more than being 'living being' with 'human DNA' and the presence of a functioning mind is utterly irrelevent, can you explain exactly on what grounds this would be wrong? The 'unique living human DNA' that you all gush on about has been preserved (as your pro-life ethics demand), and still continues on as a human being, one with a far better 'chance for a happy and productive life' that you also like to gush on about. Since you dismiss the presence or absence of a functioning brain as being irrelevent to human value, I'm curious how much handwaving you'll engage in regarding this.

Since you've handwaved away the brain, and ascribed rationality (entire computer with amazing potential of what it can do) to DNA, would you care to prove the point by undergoing a prefrontal lobotomy?

** I feel there is very little separating a late term fetus and a newborn.**

Except of course, the 'little' matters you have handwaved away, such as the fact that the fetus is still parasitical on a specific person, the severe damage and possibility of death caused by birth, etc.

I 'feel' that it would be a good idea to shove my baseball bat up your ass, and that you would be just fine if I did so. However, what I 'feel' doesn't define reality any more than what you 'feel'.

** A man can prevent her from having such a choice by simply not having sex with her.**

I find it increasingly ludicrous that the supposed pro-lifers (who are ONLY concerned about pre-natal life) on the one hand loudly insist that their position is not based on 'punishment for sex'. Yet what word do I see in every other comment by the pro-lifers? Hint, it starts with an 's' and ends with an 'x' and has one vowel in the middle.

**Surgicals are a crime against those who cannot speak for themselves**

Can't? And why not? Because they have no voicebox like deaf-mutes? Or because they have no brain, and consequently no thoughts to speak, and you are trying to handwave something nonsentient into a cute little mute newborn baby.

How about telling me how he would throw a 5 year old into a burning furnace, if, by doing so he would somehow allow 10 of those to implant which otherwise would not have, and feel holy and proud of himself afterwards.

It's really none of the man's business, any more than it's the woman's business what vitamins or medications the man might take for his prostate.

If you think an embryo is a 'child', can I claim that a toddler is an 'adult' and bring a two year to work as a hooker at the Mustang Ranch in Nevada? Or are you the only one who gets to engage in inaccurate language?

And a rapist and extortionist like you has no business either using the word 'responsible' or trying to pass off the fact that your attempted extortion scheme with anchorbaby backfired on you as being some sort of great example of 'responsibility'. If you had any sort of 'responsibility' you would not engage in such extortion schemes.

**. Discussing birth control methods before sex seems like a no brainer.**

Yes, but that isn't the goal of myintx and pro-lifers. They don't WANT birth control used. They either want people NOT to have sex, or want them punished for doing so. And in myintx's particular case, she wants to create an inflated fiat value for embryos in order so that she can use them as hostages in her extortion schemes.

I can guarantee that you will go nowhere with this strategy. I appreciate you reminding men that contraception is as much their responsibility as it is the lady's. But don't expect that men will do anything about abortion when the need arises. There is nothing they can do other than be more responsible about birth control.

I fail to see what "concerns" you have against birth control. However, what I actually hear you saying is that you are opposed or indifferent toward the use of contraceptives. "I would never pay for it" is what you said. That being said, you could hardly blame a woman for aborting an unwanted pregnancy, is light of your own irresponsible attitude toward preventing unwanted pregnancy.

Keeping all of that in mind, if you could go back and talk to one of the people—the father, mother, or abortionist—and convince them to become pro-life, which one would you choose?

...........Your premise sucks the big badoodie. I am PRO LIFE so naturally I am PRO CHOICE. Illegal abortion and sepsis and hemorrhage in childbirth are the three leading causes of maternal death worldwide. Women have blood in the fertility game. YOU DO NOT. You are trifling.

Anthropologically, Homo sapiens has three strategiesfor dealing with unwanted reproduction (births): contraception, abortion andinfanticide. All three are practiced in every culture worldwide historicallyand currently.

Those who restrict contraception and abortion make infanticide, child abandonment/abuse and maternal mortality inevitable. We have many in vitro examples of this but the one that troubles me the most at the moment is this example:http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new...

There is nothing moral about your position if yourposition is controlling women's reproductive choices by law or byshaming/blaming. Illegal abortion and sepsis and hemorrhage in childbirth arethe three leading causes of maternal death worldwide. Women have blood in thegame. YOU do not. Abortion and contraception are human rights.

Obviously I have thoughta great deal more about this than you have. YOU do not occupy the moral highground.

Abortion is legal.Murder is illegal.That which is legal cannot also be illegal.Therefore abortion is not murder.It is worth noting that abortion was not murder when it was illegal. It does not meet the legal requirements for a charge of murder.Refute me if you can.Flagged and down voted for egregious insult to pro choice men and women. I am so tired of this hoary old lie.

"The court does not care about the relationship of the progenitors and should not care."

Actually, regardless of what one's position on the abortion issue is, it doesn't appear to make sense to force rape victims (including victims of statutory rape) to pay child support if the rapist somehow acquires custody of their child (and Yes, this has previously occurred).

"You might have an argument if out social safety net was as good in the US as it is in European nations like Germany."

Do any European countries have any sort of unilateral child support opt-outs for males?

"And if you want all babies born by compelling women to bear them by law, you absolutely have no argument vis a vis child support."

If one accepts the premise that abortion is morally justifiable, then Yes, abortion is accepting responsibility. Likewise, if one accepts the premise that infanticide is morally justifiable in the event of a shortage of adoptive parents, then infanticide would likewise be accepting responsibility.

I *do* agree with you, though, that if a male is politically anti-abortion, then unless he is 100% guaranteed to be sterile without any risk of failure/surprises in regards to this, he should not sleep with any fertile or potentially fertile females who are open to the idea of getting an abortion.

I know that in 31 states, once a rapist has paid for his crime, he is entitled to child visitation. That is one of the reasons I would abort a rape pregnancy in a New York minute. Does surprise me that the court would give custody to a convicted rapist. If you have a link to such a situation, I would be interested to read it.

I do not know if Europe has opt outs. i do know that there is a stronger social safety net.

"I know that in 31 states, once a rapist has paid for his crime, he is entitled to child visitation. That is one of the reasons I would abort a rape pregnancy in a New York minute."

Yeah, I would probably support changing the law in regards to this in these 31 states. I don't think that rapists should have any rights to their child, other than perhaps for people who are guilty of misdemeanor statutory rape.

"Does surprise me that the court would give custody to a convicted rapist. If you have a link to such a situation, I would be interested to read it."

For the record, if there is any misunderstanding here, I said that I am tempted to agree that, other than for victims of rape, there should be *no* child support opt-out for males in the event of an abortion ban.

I did not state that I am tempted to support an abortion ban; again, I myself am currently politically ambivalent on the abortion issue. Thus, I do not see why exactly I deserved to have you tell me to Fvck Off or something along those lines.

I understand your perspective here; that said, it might be a good idea to keep in mind that, up to a certain age, even human infants have equal or lesser intelligence than some sentient non-human animals have.

As Dorothy Roberts writes in Killing the Black Body: Race, Reproduction and the Meaning of Liberty, “[t]he essence of Black women’s experience during slavery was the brutal denial of autonomy over reproduction.” Female slaves’ ability to produce more slaves was central to the economic interests of slaveowners and, once the importation of slaves was banned, to the perpetuation of the institution of slavery. A woman’s reproductive capacity figured into her price on the market and was as valuable as labor in the fields. As Thomas Jefferson wrote, “I consider a woman who brings a child every two years as more profitable than the best man on the farm.”

Slaveowners beat women who did not reproduce or sold them, separating them from their families. Some engaged in slave-breeding, forcing slaves considered “prime stock” to mate in order to produce particularly valuable new slaves for labor or sale. Evidence exists that slaves resisted slaveowners’ demands that they reproduce by using herbal and other makeshift contraceptive and abortive methods. Slaveowners were free to rape slaves with impunity and the children who resulted increased their wealth. A slave women’s child was not her own, but the property of her master. Even prior to conception, a slaveowner held a property interest in a woman’s future children that could be bequeathed by will.

Slavery separated black women from their future children at the moment of conception, treating the interests of the fetus as separate and conflicting with that of the mother. Though this conception of the fetus as having distinct interests to be protected from the mother is a familiar part of our discourse and legal framework today, this division did not exist for white women at the time. Professor Roberts describes one method of whipping pregnant women that illustrates this early conception of the maternal-fetal conflict. The mother would be forced to lay with her stomach in a hole dug in the ground so the mother could be beaten while the fetus was protected. “It is the most striking metaphor I know for the evils of policies that seek to protect the fetus while disregarding the humanity of the mother,” she writes.

There were no inaccuracies in my language. "Unborn child" is a valid term. It's a term used in many state laws to describe the human being that can be killed by an evil person during the course of a crime against a pregnant woman.

It's your language that is made up. Keep it up. You're just making your side look desperate.

IF there is any comparison between abortion and slavery it's a selfish woman treating her unborn child like property that can be discarded like trash - just like selfish slave owners used to treat their slaves - like property that can be discarded if they not wanted or or convenient. Pretty accurate comparison.

That's not true at all. Every man who gets a woman pregnant when the circumstances are not ideal is faced with the question of whether or not to get an abortion. I don't have the stats handy, but I have read that a good portion (perhaps most) of abortions would have been avoided if the guy would have stuck around to help raise the child.

**If "unborn child" wasn't a valid term it wouldn't be used in so many state laws!**

So... since so many state laws once said that blacks weren't human, according to you that's true. The term is medically incorrect no matter how many sad feelies politicians want to cater to by putting it into laws.

I don't see a big push going on to repeal the state laws that use the term unborn child... many people wanted the laws changed that said slaves weren't full people... and many people want the laws changed that say unborn children don't have rights. Where's the campaigning to overturn fetal homicide laws that use the term "unborn child"? There isn't any because you know it's a valid term. Just like the term "child in utero".

You can quite with the made up anchorbaby b.s. It's really making you look bad. Like you're grasping at straws because you lost the debate. It's pathetic.

As a side note, this is a bit off-topic, but here is an advice for *pro-choice* males: Just because a female says that she will get an abortion if she gets pregnant does not necessarily mean that she will actually get one in such a situation. After all, people can change their minds, including on this issue.

Repeatedly claiming that an embryo is a 'child', or getting politicians (who provably know little or nothing about science) to write such terminology into 'law' does not make it so. Nor does your repeated claim that I am 'grasping at straws' make that true, either.

Well, I see the initial fusion of egg and sperm and the unique and most improbable sequence of the resulting DNA to be as close an analogy to "random number generation" as possible in the biological realm. For the early embryo and fetus which as ofyet has no brain and is nothing much more than a rapidly multiplying clump ofcells that is pretty much following an automatic program without any sentience, I honestly have no clue why people would be opposed to aborting a fetus at this stage.

Can I be replaced? In the grand scheme of things, yes. I don't think I'm particularly special at all, but I mean something to my family. Can my family be replaced? Yes, in the grand scheme of things. But I place value in sentience and the human experience, not really in a particular arrangement of nucleotides at the beginning of conception.

As to whether I should be killed, I have lived life as an independent human beingfor quite a few years now, and have innate and conscious life goals, as well as a wife and kid. I think terminating my life and terminating a early fetus are quitedifferent things. BTW, I am opposed to late term abortions because I think fetusespast a certain stage are beginning to have human experiences, and are more thanjust a random initial condition. However, I do not think abortion of even late termfetuses should be illegal, even though I find aborting them personally and emotionallytroubling.

First of all, the fact that something is written into a law, by a politician who is either ignorant of the matter, or simply trying to get votes (or both) does not make it true. Neither does the fact that a lot of other people WANT it to be true make it true, either.

Secondly, it seems to me that you're trying to play the usual pro-lifer equivocation fallacy with the word 'child', which can have more than one meaning. Case in point, my mother might tell someone that she has three 'children'. As of today, her youngest 'child' is 35 years old. A 35 year old man might be his mother's 'child', but he is not a 'child' in a physical or developmental sense. Ditto for an embryo, in a technical sense it might be referred to as the 'child' of the mother, but it is NOT a 'child' in a physical or developmental sense any more than a 35 year old adult man is. The pretense of the pro-lifers that it is, due to the word 'child' having more than one definition displays that they have the mentality of 6 year olds.

Irrelevent whether it is a valid 'legal' term or not. It is not valid when applied in a biological or developemental sense. Do you honestly think I am so stupid that if you try the exact same equivocation fallacy using different words, I might fall for it this time?

**Too bad it makes you think about the human being you support killing.**

The death of something that happens to have human DNA, but no brain, is not something that bothers me to any great degree. That's because, unlike you, I actually place a value on the human brain, rather than reducing it's value to zero.

Explain to me exactly how I insulted my mother, btw? I really fail to understand how using her as an example in a grammar lesson to explain how a woman might use the word 'children' - such as my mother telling someone that she had three 'children' does not necessarily equate to the 'children' referred to in such an example necessarily being 'children' in a biological or developemental sense. The youngest of the 'children' in the example I gave is a 35 year old man, and a 35 year old man is NOT a child in a biological or developemental sense. Neither is an embryo. Your statement about 'killing unborn children' as applied to abortion makes even less sense than if you referred to the murder of a 35 year old man as 'killing adult children'. The first has not become a 'child' yet in a developemental sense, and the second is past that stage.

Too bad if pointing out this equivocation fallacy upsets you and your sad feelies about embryoes, but it is most certainly NOT an insult about my mother. Only an idiot would think so. Are you an idiot? Or are you just engaged in the usual pro-life ad-hominem fallacies?

Pro-lifers do their best, but FAIL to dehumanize actual people by attempting to claim they are no more valuable than a speck with less brain than a paramecium. Stop babbling the term 'human beiing' as if it's some sort of holy word that brings down magical rights like light pouring out of heaven. You've been told that before and I'm not impressed by your stupidity in continually repeating it. I have a degree in biology sweetiepie. I'm aware of what species an embryo belongs to. Being a member of the human species does not grant rights unless there is also a human brain present. Nor are there any 'rights' (either with or without a brain) to the bodies of other people. Not if you 'need' it. Not for a 'few short months'. Or any other period of time.

Go back to your extortion schemes and claiming that they somehow constitute 'responsibility' on your part.

Oh please. If there was a condition where a person when brain dead and the doctor said they would most likely have a functioning brain within 9 months you know that the family wouldn't be allowed to pull the plug (unless the person put down in writing to pull the plug). If you really had a degree in biology you would know that if not killed or miscarried, an unborn child will most likely develop a brain - it's all part of the LIFE CYCLE of a human being - a lifecycle that isn't complete until well after birth. Killing an unborn child - at 10 weeks or 30 weeks has the same result - a human being is denied a chance at a full and productive life. If you support killing one, you might as well support killing the other.

Again, you're dehumanizing a human being in a lame attempt to justify killing him or her. ALL innocent human beings should have an equal right to life.

First of all, dumbass, people who are bonafide brain dead do not 'recover'. Not in 9 months. Not in 9 years. You display your ignorance by proposing such a thing. Secondly, people do recover from comas, but that is a distinct state from being brain dead. Since for among other reasons, a person in a coma still has brain function. Thirdly, rights do not exist either before, or after, the existence of the brain. That includes the right to life, and it ALSO includes the right to develop a brain. Fourthly, there is no right - to life - or to anything else, that gives you the right to own someone else's body. Not because you have sad feelies, and not because you want to run extortion schemes.

**a human being is denied a chance at a full and productive life.** There is no 'human being' in the mental sense of the word in existence at the time.

No, myintx's supposed 'great concern' for 'human beings' to be given a 'chance' for life strangely coincides ONLY with what can be used to inconvenience, control, and extort OTHER people, but never her precious self. Case in point, the other posters here have told me that Myintx has claimed that the entire process of pregnancy and birth are no more difficult and painful than sitting on a couch and eating a bag of Doritos.

Now, you would THINK, given the supposed ease myintx claims for pregnancy and birth, that myintx, being so very loudly CONCERNED about the 'tiny innocent vulnerable defenseless' frozen embryos in an IVF facility, would volunteer for such an EASY (so she claims) thing as 9 months of pregnancy and giving birth in order to give one of those frozen embryos (which otherwise will eventually degrade to the point of death from being frozen or else be discarded) a CHANCE! For its VERY LIFE!!

But NO! When asked if she would volunteer herself for something so EASY, in order to save the VERY LIFE of those 'tiny vulnerable innocent human beings', Myintx said that she would NOT! Not because pregnancy and birth are really very painful and threatening to life and health, no, they are still really EASY (according to Myintx), but because it is the RESPONSIBILITY of the parents of the embryos (rather than herself) to bring each and every last one of them to term.

So, what am I to think of this? Given that Myintx claims that pregnancy and birth are as easy as sitting on a couch and eating a bag of doritos, yet she would not do such an easy thing to save the VERY LIFE of a frozen embryo, because it's the parent's responsibility, I can only surmise that if she saw a baby drowning in 3 feet of cold water, she most certainly would let it drown, since firstly going up to your waist in cold water is by far less pleasant than eating a bag of doritos, and after all, it would be the PARENT'S responsibility to do so, not hers.

I never said brain dead people would recover.. see the word IF in my post above? Yes, you saw it.. you just had no valid rebuttal so you started with the name calling.

All innocent human beings SHOULD have a right to life. Unborn children are human beings and should have a right to life. But pro-aborts fight against those rights so they can keep killing inconvenient or unwanted unborn children. Truly sickening that there are people on this planet that think of 'me, me, me, me, me, OH and me!' and would kill their own offspring simply because their offspring was unwanted.

**Truly sickening that there are people on this planet that think of 'me, me, me, me, me, OH and me!' and would kill their own offspring simply because their offspring was unwanted.**

Yes, the planet is full of truly sickening people. Like you, for instance, who would have an 'oops' baby on purpose in order to use as a hostage in your attempted extortion and enslavement of babydaddy and only thought of 'me, me, me OH and me' when you decided to pull such an extortion scheme.

**All innocent human beings SHOULD have a right to life.**

Rights don't exist without a brain. That means a FUNCTIONING brain.

**Unborn children are human beings and should have a right to life.**

See above. Also, the right to life does not convey the right to the ownership of someone else's body against their will. If someone needs someone else's body to survive, too fucking bad. They are worm bait. End of story. Now go back to your doritos and extortion schemes.

You don't get it at all. There is no reason to waste money on contraceptives because there is no reason to be having sex when you don't want children. I consider my avoidance of sex to be the most responsible thing I can do and I wish other men saw it the same way.

I was there. I was 7 years old in 1950. Daily life was a horror show for women. There were MALE and FEMALE want ads and male and female jobs. The first question asked in a job interview was 'What if you get pregnant? And that single question could deny you a clerk's job because men were more 'reliable.' There was no daycare. No checking accounts of mortgages for women without a male permission. On and on and on ...

SEXUAL ETHICS 101 - a conversation in the comments to the above article.

I thought the exchange of opinions noteworthy. I reproduce it here with appropriate editing to make the conversation more clear:

Cherry:Discuss it with the State. Not me. The State does not care about the quality of the relationship between the man and the woman. The concern is the child. The standard is that a child is entitled to the support of both progenitors.

Kestrel:Aren't you here to discuss things? I am.

Reiterating:The conventional wisdom appears to be that a man should have no say in whether or not a woman bears his child (that she may unilaterally decide to abort his child even if he wants the child to be born), but also that a man should be compelled to pay child support if she bears his child against his wishes.

Please explain how this is not, fundamentally, a dichotomy.

Cherry:Men have choices.If men want to control their own reproduction, they can do the following things:

Use contraception or get vasectomy.Practice abstinence.Screw other men.Have a talk with the woman you are about to screw about what her plans are for unexpected pregnancy. If you don't like the answer, don't screw her.

Once a man has left his swimmers behind in her, all his chances to affect reproduction (choices) are gone.That is not unfair. That is biology.

Kestrel:I guess men should never take a woman at her word when she tells him before sex that she's on the pill or has had her tubes tied.Good to know, thanks.

Cherry:No, they never should.For four reasons:

Contraceptives fail.Once pregnant, a woman may decide to gestate. Pregnant for women is emotionally very different than nonpregnant.Some women are evil.And last, but not least, men (just like women) are totally responsible for their bodies and reproductive capacity.

Kestrel:You won me over with #3. Now you know the position from which I speak.

(Not that some MEN aren't evil as well....)

I still say, however, that if a woman can decide to abort my child against my will, then conversely, if she decides to bear my child against my will, I should be able to walk into a courthouse and divest myself of all rights and responsibilities with the stroke of a pen and a seal from a notary public.

Cherry:Thank you for pushing me to discuss this. I am in your debt. You are free to advocate your position, which is where we started. In Europe where all kinds of support exists for women and their children, your position is probably arguable with a fair chance of success.

The birth of a child, for most human beings, is a life changing and attitude changing event. Do you have children? Some men could give a shit forever. And some men who could not have given a shit fall in love when they see the face of their child.

Kestrel:Three boys, two different mothers. Ages 23, 12, and 11.

Cherry:So why are you fighting me on this, Dad?

Kestrel:On principle by and large and in the main. For the rest of it, well, I'll make sure you get an advance copy of my autobiography. Autographed.btw 12 year old is eating popcorn right now as 11 year old reloads his full auto Nerf Dart gun....that GRANDPA got him. I can be subjected to a burst at any time.Thanks, Pop.

A reason for having sex, you mean? Because people are wired to enjoy having sex. For humans, it's a social activity. Abstinence is certainly a valid choice, for those who wish to engage in such a lifestyle choice. That's far different than claiming people "have no reason for" having sex unless they want children.